


The One Who Grieves

by Omoni



Series: Original Fiction [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Death, Descent into Madness, F/M, Friendship/Love, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Loss, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Suicide, True Love, True fiction, You were my whole world
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-20
Updated: 2018-10-20
Packaged: 2019-08-04 15:42:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16349489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Omoni/pseuds/Omoni
Summary: One day, a being from another realm becomes curious enough to slip into our own, and borrows the body of one of us, to try and figure out what makes us what we are, and itself, itself.However, it discovered, through her, a world through the eyes of prey, of the hunted.Of a rabbit who wishes to make friends with the wolf, only to be eaten moments, later.Is there any way to save this creature called human?





	The One Who Grieves

Twice, there was a strange being.

It wasn't really one or the other, but decided to be a woman, just for now, when it decided to slip between veils. It wafted about the heads of others, searching all day, and it was only at night that it finally found a proper vessel. Borrowing the body of a baby it found born in that same night, and slipped into her mind. It reverted herself to this new mind's level, and allowed itself to grow, in silence, inside this being, to see if it could figure out what it meant to be one of _these_.

This interference was mostly invisible, save within the small one's mind. Instead of normal human thoughts and instincts, she ended up being too open, too easy with her emotions, unable to understand why such limitations would be placed upon them, and unable to abide by her instincts until too late.

She trusted. She loved. She fought for and defended. She stood up and took the blows for the people she loved – and whom she thought loved her, too, in the same ways.

But this was simply not the case.

Even as a child, the other children seemed to sense that unnatural passenger within her mind, and treated her as though she were alien.

They abused her. They used her. They humiliated her.

Over and over and over.

And yet, she could not stop. She could not shut down her mind, when it said, _Try again. This time, they will be different. Not everyone must be like this. There must be someone like me._

So, she kept trying. She remained open and honest. She put her heart and soul into everything she did, and gave it to everyone she met.

As she aged, it became clear that, no matter how often she tried, she was not _meant_ to be loved.

Like in all societies, she was one of the hated.

Like in all litters, she was the runt of the bunch, and unlikely to live long.

But she did.

She let others, ones she'd loved and lost, push her down and away, willing to take it if it meant they stayed...

Only to find that, at some point, they left.

Either forever, or simply from her view alone, they _disappeared_.

Soon, her heart began to bleed, and her soul drowned in those red tears, unable to keep the pain silent, anymore. She started to cry out, to scream into the night, to demand why she was hated when all she wanted was to love and be loved...

The one who watched was dismayed, horrified that its mere presence hurt this being, one it had wanted to make happy, so it could learn what those feelings meant.

Yet as the years passed, and more of her blood was spilt, it realised that even _she_ didn't know what they meant, because she'd given up trying to learn, and had begun to agree with everyone else.

She began to tear herself apart.

And it had to watch, helpless, as its almost beloved child destroyed herself, simply because she felt so much, and was hated for it.

She started to allow cruel people into her heart, people she knew were bad, but who were the only people who seemed to notice she existed – even if it was solely to be used.

It was what she felt she deserved: the worst.

She pretended it was love. But she knew, just like those who used her body knew, it was only hatred.

Twice, she let her body be used, in different but equally intimate ways, and that hatred almost _killed_ the one who watched. Because that hatred was for _herself_ , as well as the ones who wanted to rape her, who managed to rape her, completely, in nightmares and daymares...

Her _soul_ had been raped, too.

She hated herself, so much that by then, she decided she not only _deserved_ it, but was a fool to even expect anything else.

Yet she still fought back, those two times.

And only it would not _let_ her.

Those two times were the only times it fought _for_ her, when she would have surrendered, and allowed herself to be _obliterated_ , in the cruelest of ways, because she truly felt it was the only version of sex she deserved.

It knew better. It tried to help her. And it had at least succeeded in that one way. 

But as she aged, she grew stronger, and when she hurt, she carved trenches into her body, allowing it to weep those tears she could no longer set free from her eyes.

The one who watched wept, too, feeling such agony at the sight of its beloved soulmate, one it had only wanted to bring joy to.

She no longer understood what joy meant.

Every single hope for happiness had been stolen from her, stripped from her, while she stood naked before predators, eager to taste her weakened, unloved flesh.

The one who watched was _desperate_ , trying to help her see joy. In dogs, in cats, in art...

And it would work, once and a while.

During those moments, they were merged, at last, speaking with one voice. To an unseen audience, using characters she stole from someone more creative, she wrote her own story, weaving it through every story, piece by piece, and found some relief when there was positive response - and sympathy for the characters she projected herself, upon.

Despite this, she knew those stories were only read for the things she did _not_ create. And it hurt her, because she truly felt that her own stories were as worthless as her soul.

But _it_ knew better.

It knew her _true_ soul, her true _name_.

It had watched her grow up, had tried to save her, but only made it worse.

And with her, it discovered what pain truly was, as she made its same mistakes with others, as it made with her...

It _hated_ that.

An emotion it had never known, until it had known pain, and from it, there was only one word for how badly it felt, for both of them.

As she kept falling, lower and lower, unable to see the people she'd somehow managed to find, people who _did_ love her, who _did_ understand her worth, and who _wanted_ her to have the same things as the one who watched, did.

But her years of abuse made her blind and deaf. She fell into addiction, the soothing fake bliss numbing her screaming soul and aching body.

Fleeting, like all other joys in her life...

Eventually, she _did_ begin to see.

When the one person she'd trusted, with her entire body, cherished her instead of abusing her, didn't leave, even when she confessed all of her darkness and pain, even when, years and years later, she wanted to die, he refused to let her.

The one who watched her watched _him_ closely, too.

Throughout its human's life, this one had appeared within her first two decades, and they connected.

She never understood why, but it soon did.

He loved her like it, did. _Better_ , even. He could love her body like she deserved, hold her when her pains of the past, smothered for years, began to attack her, physically, too...

He didn't leave her.

And while there was a span of time in which she allowed herself to believe she deserved him, it did not last.

Not when her pain brought _him_ pain.

Not when her pain brought _everyone_ pain.

As an adult, all she wanted was to make people happy, so that they would never know the sadness she had at their age.

But she failed. She _always_ failed.

She could never do _anything_ right, somehow doing everything _wrong_...

And when _they_ began to disappear, too, just like the others in her youth, she couldn't take it, anymore.

Nothing she could do, nothing she had ever done, in her entire life, mattered, anymore.

Everything she did, whether it was trust or love, or both, was _never enough._

She had to watch them suffer like she did, like it had watched her, when all she'd wanted was to spare any child a childhood like her own.

But she failed.

Every time.

Soon, even _he_ couldn't see her, as well, anymore.

It was not his choice; he would never choose that.

She didn't let him choose.

She started to disappear, too.

She became a wraith of grief, of pain and sorrow, of regret and fury and guilt, _always_ guilt, _so much guilt..._

She knew she didn't deserve him.

She'd never deserved the people she'd tried to help but hindered and hurt, instead, either.

She knew she deserved only to be hated and used.

And that was when it broke its vow.

It began to show her, in her sleep, a world that it felt would become real, if she gave up. It wasn't _sure_ if what it showed her was the _actual_ truth, but it was how _it_ felt would happen.

The world suffered. It was dark, lonely, grim.

The people she'd tried to help still lost. But sooner, and in worse ways.

And _he_ disappeared, too.

That, it knew, was the truth, for sure. It had watched him, closely, and saw how much he loved her, how desperately he was trying to keep her alive.

Now, he was her. He did all she ever did, to keep those fading people opaque.

He cried, his heart bleeding beside hers, begging her to come home, to come back into his arms, to let him love her, treat her like she _deserved_ , to let _herself_ live, too...

The one who watched helped, as best as it could. It took control, several times, in such subtle ways that she never knew; she simply just assumed a drug had finally done its job, and brought back a shred of the humanity she'd lost within her pain.

In these moments, she lived for him.

She was his.

She did let him worship her, just as she worshipped him, and it felt real and good and true.

He healed her, made her feel beautiful and invincible…

But then, she would fail, again, not realising that, sometimes, there truly _wasn't_ anything she could do, that she _wasn't_ poison, but often a kind of end-of-life drug, one that makes the end easier to embrace...

She would fall, each time, harder than before.

And the one who watched found itself losing its own hold on her.

The final time was when she lost the last of those she'd loved, like her own family, those she lived for, too, of whom she _begged_ to stay alive, to see it through, until it got better, because it _would_ , but only _alive_...

She lost them.

And in turn, it lost its hold on _her_.

She fell, and she did not get up, again.

She disappeared, in his arms, apologising to the end, for everything she'd ever done wrong...

Her last apology was for being alive, at all.

The fact that, in living, she felt she'd robbed someone else more deserving of the life she'd squandered, failed at, ruined for everyone she _ever_ loved...

When her heart stopped, the one who watched was engulfed in grief, trying to restart it, just like _he_ was, his own screams for her to live its own...

But she stopped fighting.

She stopped trying.

She stopped.

And it was forced to abandon her, and slip back to where it came from.

When it did, it felt lost. Meaningless. Confused.

She'd done everything she could to bring the joy she was never given to others.

But because of that, she never truly learnt what joy _was_ , and had made anyone she loved either hate her – or disappear.

And because she could never succeed, she could never help others love themselves...

She could never love _herself_ , like she deserved.

She'd wanted to stay, for him.

That was her second-last regret: the pain she brought him, by disappearing, like everyone else around her.

The one who'd watched was so hurt.

Was _that_ what they were about?

Pain? Suffering? Abuse and hatred?

Or was it what she had shared only with him, and the last ones she lost?

That warm, happy, open love, one that brought anyone close enough to laughter...

Within the arms of the ones she loved – and whom actually loved her like she did, them – she revealed the beauty of her species.

But when there was no one left for her to hold, she forgot the arms still around her, and drowned within the blood of every moment of hatred ever inflicted upon her.

The one who'd watched remembered that warmth, and knew it was possible to create and maintain, even within the heart of someone like her: punished for wanting love, and abandoned when she loved.

When she had that family, she was joy, itself.

When she was loved, and allowed to love to her fullest, she _shone_ , and without seeing it.

Yes, sometimes it wasn't enough, and without knowing it was because _nothing_ was enough, by then. She took it as her personal failure, her inability to rescue her distressed loved ones from the river of death.

The one who'd watched wasn't satisfied with her ending. It didn't want her to end that way.

Perhaps in his arms, still, but after a _long_ life, one fulfilled and without regret _or_ self-hatred.

She'd already had enough hatred in her life, from everyone else around her.

Of all the people she should hate, herself was last on that list.

Now it knew what to do.

It went back, to the time before she disappeared, early enough to stop her, but in a way to ensure that she would stop _herself_.

It wanted her to love herself, too, just like she did the ones she clung to so tightly.

It knew it would take a great deal of time, but it knew how much time it would take, and didn't _care_.

The one who now loved returned to the shattered mind of the one who taught it love, and devoted itself to teaching her the same lesson she'd so effortless taught itself.

* * *

There is an ending to this story.

But it hasn't happened, yet.

The one who loved is still trying to help her.

He is still trying to help her, too.

Those last few, whose deaths killed her, are trying, too.

And she is even trying to help herself.

But only time will tell if the one who loved will ever teach she who grieves how to truly love herself.

**AN ENDING**


End file.
